A light-sensitive material comprising a support and a light-sensitive layer provided thereon which contains a silver halide, a reducing agent and a polymerizable compound can be employed in an image-forming method in which a latent image of the silver halide is formed and the polymerizable compound is polymerized to form a corresponding image.
Examples of the image-forming methods are described in Japanese Patent Publication Nos. 45(1970)-11149, 47(1972)-20741 and 49(1974)-10697, and Japanese Patent Provisional Publication Nos. 57(1982)-138632, 57(1982)-142638, 57(1982)-176033, 57(1982)-211146, 58(1983)-107529, 58(1983)-121031 and 58(1983)-169143. In those methods, during the developing stage of the exposed silver halide with the developing agent, the co-existing polymerizable compound (e.g., vinyl compound) is polymerized to form an imagewise polymer compound. Accordingly, those methods require a developing treatment using a liquid, and the developing treatment also requires a relatively long period of time.
As improved image-forming methods, those using a dry process are described in Japanese Patent Provisional Publications Nos. 60(1985)-69062, 61(1986)-73145, 61(1986)183640, 61(1986)-188535 and 61(1986)-228441. Those improved methods employ a recording material (i.e., light-sensitive material) comprising a support and a light-sensitive layer provided thereon which contains a light-sensitive silver salt (i.e., silver halide), a reducing agent, a cross-linkable compound (i.e., polymerizable compound) and a binder.
In the above-stated various image-forming methods, the polymerizable compound in an area where a latent image of the silver halide has been formed is polymerized.
Japanese Patent Provisional Publication No. 62(1987)-70836 describes another image-forming method in which the polymerizable compound in an area where a latent image of the silver halide has not been formed is polymerized. In this method, when the light-sensitive material is heated, polymerization of the polymerizable compound in the area where a latent image of the silver halide has been formed is inhibited owing to the function of the reducing agent, and polymerization of the polymerizable compound in other area is accelerated.
As an embodiment of the light-sensitive materials employable in the above various image-forming methods, Japanese Patent Provisional Publications Nos. 61(1986)-275742 and 61(1986)-278849 describe a light-sensitive material using microcapsules which contain components of the light-sensitive layer such as a silver halide and a SO polymerizable compound. The light-sensitive material using such microcapsule (also referred to as "light-sensitive microcapsule") has an advantage of producing an image of high quality, particularly an image of high sharpness.
The development of the light-sensitive material is conducted under heating. However, the light-sensitive material temporarily heated to an elevated temperature requires a long period of time for lowering the temperature of the material, and hence the development is excessively done to deteriorate quality of the resulting image. Further, even in the image-forming method using the same heating process, the procedure of development tends to vary depending on various conditions such as an external temperature, a heating temperature, an amount of water contained in the material and a heating time. 0 For avoiding such unfavorable phenomena, there have been proposed other image-forming methods which are similar to the above-mentioned ones. For example, a method of using an acid polymer for neutralization in a diffusion transferring process is described in Research Disclosure (Volume 123, pp. 22, Volume 180, pp. 18,030) or British Patent No. 2,082,72A, but when this method is applied to the above-mentioned light-sensitive material, for example when a base is employed as a development accelerator, the resulting image is reduced in discrimination because the base is rapidly neutralized. Otherwise, Japanese Patent Provisional Publication Nos. 49(1974)-58642 and 50(1975)-57452 describe acid components dissolved or releasing a volatile acid at a temperature higher than 60.degree. C. as a compound releasing an acid in the heating stage. However, when those compounds are used in the light-sensitive material containing a silver halide, a reducing agent and a polymerizable compound, the base is neutralized prior to initiation of the development under heating to inhibit the development, and thereby the contrast of the resulting image lowers.
There is also known a photographic material which uses a compound having an active group which shows an antifogging function or a development inhibiting function wherein the active group is blocked to obtain an inert compound (i.e., antifogging precursor or development inhibitor precursor). The blocking of the active group of the antifogging agent or the development inhibitor makes it possible not only to restrain adsorption of the active group to the stored light-sensitive silver halide and sensitivity-decreasing function caused by the formation of silver salt but also to release those agents at the desired stage, whereby occurrence of fogging can be reduced without lowering the sensitivity. Further, fogging caused by excessive development can be also avoided, or the development can be terminated at the desired time.
Examples of the methods utilizing the blocking technique include a method using a blocking group such as acyl group and sulfonyl group as described in Japanese Patent Publication No. 47(1972)-44805 (U.S. Pat. No. 3,615,617); a method using a blocking group capable of releasing a development inhibitor through so-called "Reverse Michael Reaction" as described in Japanese Patent Publication Nos. 54(1979)-39727 (U.S. Pat. No. 3,674,478) and 55(1980)-9696 (U.S. Pat. No. 4,009,029); a method using a blocking group releasing a development inhibitor accompanied by production of quinonemethide or its similar compounds by means of electron movement in the molecule as described in Japanese Patent Publication No. 54(1979)-39727 and Japanese Patent Provisional Publication Nos. 57(1982)-135944, 57(1982)-135945 and 57(1982)-136640; a method using a ring-closure, reaction in the molecule as described in Japanese Patent Provisional Publication No. 55(1980)-53330; a method using ring cleavage of 5-members or 6-members as described in Japanese Patent Provisional Publication Nos. 57(1982)-76541 (U.S. Pat. No. 4,335,200), 57(1982)-135949 and 57(1982)-179842; a method using a blocking group releasing a development inhibitor by means of so-called "Michael Reaction" as described in Japanese Patent Provisional Publication Nos. 59(1984)-201057, 61(1986)-43739, 61(1986)-95346 and 61(1986)-95347; and a method using a blocking group releasing a development inhibitor accompanied by developing reaction of silver halide as described in Japanese Patent Provisional Publication Nos. 60(1985)-233648, 61(1986)-156043 and 61(1986)-236549.